we are young
by Jess the Enthusiast
Summary: you feel as if you've been kicked in the gut but at the same time you feel warm. it's almost like being happy. james/lily


She insists on going to see a muggle doctor. You don't really know much about them so that makes you nervous, but then you remember that she's the one that doesn't feel well and if seeing a muggle doctor makes her more comfortable, then so be it.

She feels too sick to apparate and you can't exactly floo there so you both take a few buses and walk a few blocks. You hold her hand the whole way there. She's quiet and you assume that it's just because she's been feeling so nauseous lately but then she's biting her lip and avoiding your eyes and you don't know what that means.

You ask her if she's okay and you know that it's a stupid question because obviously she's not since you're taking her to see a doctor. But you have to ask anyway.

You nudge her gently when she doesn't immediately respond, but then she sends you _that_ smile and you're convinced when she replies with a quiet but seemingly confident yes. But then she goes back to looking out the window sullenly and you're not so sure.

The doctor's office is kind of crowded and you sit together quietly in the waiting room. She rushes to the bathroom once to throw up and she doesn't let you come with her to hold back her hair. She used to about a week ago when this all started, but lately she's been more quiet and distant. And you're not sure why.

You're finally in a room waiting for the doctor to see her and she's twitchy and fidgety and seems incredibly nervous. You grab a hold of one of her hands.

You laugh at her expression and give her cheek a peck, trying to lighten the mood by reminding her that it's the flu and not a death sentence.

She gives you a strange look and doesn't say anything. For the first time, you feel as if she's hiding something from you.

You sit there quietly, looking at anything but each other, when she finally says your name.

You turn to face her and she looks even more nervous than she had before. She tells you in a careful, measured voice that she doesn't think that she has the flu.

You don't know what she means by that so you ask her, and you laugh because you're not really sure what to do and that's all you're good at.

She doesn't say anything for a while. You wait for her to summon up the courage to say whatever it is she wants to tell you. And then she squeezes your hand. She tells you that she's been thinking about it and she thinks that she might be –

But then the doctor walks in.

A lot questions are asked and a lot of tests are taken that you're unfamiliar with. She blushes profusely when asked if she's sexually active and you can't help but laugh at her embarrassment.

When it doesn't seem like she's going to say anything, you confirm that you've been married for nearly a year so yeah she's sexually active.

The doctor makes a brief comment about how you're both so young and you brush it off because everyone says that so you're used to it.

She stays quiet and you notice that she looks like she's preparing herself for the next question. You don't know what it is, but you're sure that she does since she's probably done this so many times before.

The doctor asks her about there being any possibility of a pregnancy and just the sound of the word makes you feel weird. Nothing against pregnant people, but you can't exactly imagine something like happening to you unless it's in the far, far future and at this point in your life it just feels like a disease or something that happens to other people. And you've never felt like you had anything to worry about.

But then you notice that she isn't saying anything and didn't exactly say yes either but you feel kind of sweaty and hot anyway.

You say her name and it sounds like it's coming from somewhere in the distance and she's not even looking at you.

And then she quietly says to the doctor that she doesn't know and it feels like she's dropped a bomb of sorts and everything feels quiet.

The doctor nods his head and leaves the room, saying that he'll be back with the appropriate tests in a moment.

And then you're suddenly alone with her. She doesn't seem to want to look at you but she's all you want to look at. You try not to let your gaze drift to her stomach but you can't help it. She certainly doesn't look pregnant but then again if she is, she will start to soon. And you can't picture her - your Lily - being pregnant. You've both been very careful and this just isn't something that happens to people like you. This happens to people like the Longbottoms who are nearing thirty and have steady jobs and have been married for practically forever. This doesn't happen to people like you, the Potters: two scrappy young kids who got married because you're young and in love and afraid of dying in a losing war before you had the chance to show it.

But maybe it's just a false alarm. And you tell yourself that. That maybe it's just a false alarm. Because she has the flu and instead you'll be taking care of her for the next few days rather than having a baby in nine months that will need to be cared for for the next eighteen years.

Eighteen years. You'll be thirty-eight when the baby's eighteen years old and that sounds like your whole life. But then you try not to think about it because she's not having a baby, she just has the flu.

You chance another look at her and she's not looking back. You squeeze her hand and remind her that it'll be okay but it just ends up sounding forced and hollow. She nods slowly and rests her head against your shoulder. Your heart beats insanely fast as the moments pass and you imagine hers doing the same.

The doctor's back before you know it and while you expected to feel relieved, you suddenly feel worse. Because in his hands is the test, the very test that determines whether or not the next eighteen years of your life will include a tiny person that you accidentally created with the love of your life.

It seems kind of funny to you that this will all be determined by her peeing on a stick but you don't have it in you to laugh. You wait outside the bathroom door for her, trying to remind yourself that this is happening to her just as much as it is to you if not more so since she's the one that will have to have the thing inside her. You try to remind yourself to be there for her when she comes out so you take her hand the moment she emerges from the bathroom.

She tells you in a quiet voice that you have to wait three minutes to know for sure and those feel like the longest three minutes of your life. You're sitting together, holding hands, and it just reminds you of how much you love being close to her and how that love landed you in this mess in the first place.

You try to look at it positively though. Sure there's a war going on out there and sure the two of you are just gonna be barely twenty in a few months, but if you had to be in this mess with anyone, you're so happy that it's her. There's no one in the world that you love more than her and making a person with her doesn't exactly sound so bad. Although the idea that you're so young and have the power to do something like that sounds and feels so bizarre. But it'll be okay because it's with her and you wouldn't rather it be anyone but her.

You want to tell her this because you can feel the fear and the anxiety radiating off of her but it doesn't feel like the right time. Maybe later when you're both laying in bed and marveling over the little life you've both somehow created.

But then again, she might only have the flu.

The doctor comes back and even though you've had three minutes to contemplate what the rest of your life could be like it doesn't feel like enough. You need more time. More time to be a kid, more time to be newlyweds, more time to be reckless and free.

But then he says it and he's congratulating you both on how your world is both falling apart and coming together all at once and you're suddenly very aware of the fact that this is really happening. You feel as if you've been kicked in the gut but at the same time you feel warm. It's almost like being happy.

You realize that she's crying and it might be happy tears but you don't think so by the way that they remind you of the tears she shed when her parents died. So you take her into your arms and she leans into you and you tell her that everything is gonna be okay even though you're not so sure of that yourself.

She's crying now, but you know that later tonight you'll both be laying in bed, marveling over the little life you've both somehow created. And then you'll tell her that even though you're both too young and the world is too scary, you're happy that it happened with her rather than with someone else. And things will feel better.

Because they just have to.

A/N: Special thanks to Laura for sending me the prompt for this, otherwise it would have never been written! I hope you enjoyed it; please let me know in a review

~Jess :D

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter; all rights go to the lovely JK Rowling. Title comes from the song by Fun.


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